Teodosiia

Teodosiia aka Feodosiia [Теодосія or Феодосія; Teodosija or Feodosija]. Map: VIII-16. A city (2011 pop 70,043) on the coast of the Black Sea in southeastern Crimea. It originated in the 6th century BC as Theodosia, a colony of the Greek city-state of Miletus, and developed into an important trading center. From 355 BC it was part of the Bosporan Kingdom. In the 4th century AD Theodosia was sacked by the Huns, and at the end of the 6th century it was captured by the Khazars. During the second half of the 1st millennium the city had close ties with Byzantium. The Genoese established a trading post called Kaffa on Tatar-held territory in the 13th century. In 1475 it was captured by the Turks, who developed it into the largest slave market in the Crimea. The Zaporozhian Cossacks sacked Kaffa and freed the slaves in 1616, 1628, and 1675. During the Russo-Turkish War of 1686–99 the town was captured by the Russian army, in 1771, and annexed by the Russian Empire in 1783. It reassumed its ancient name of Teodosiia, and it became a county center of Tavriia gubernia in 1802. The completion of a railway line (1892) and new port facilities (1895) stimulated economic development: the number of factories in the town increased from 13 in 1891 to 30 in 1894. By 1904 the population had reached 30,600. The main exports were grain and tobacco. Under Soviet rule Teodosiia was part of the Crimean ASSR from 1921. Its population declined from 35,400 in 1921 to 28,700 in 1926. Under the five-year plans Teodosiia developed into a manufacturing and health resort center. Most of its inhabitants are occupied in the sanatoriums, mud baths, rest homes, and children's resorts. Its industrial base consists of a tobacco factory (est 1861), a machine plant, a building-materials manufacturing complex, a furniture factory, and several food-processing plants. It has the Ivan Aivazovsky Art Gallery (est 1880) and a regional studies museum. Its main architectural monuments are the remaining walls and turrets of the Genoese fortress (14th–15th century), a 13th- to 15th-century church, and a 17th-century mosque.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]